Tech support's NSFW problem

Help desk staffers can be caught in the middle when BYOD users get very personal with their devices.

Protecting IT from users The ideal fix is to create a corporate container to hold all business applications, including corporate email and Internet browsing.

And the best way to achieve that goal is with the emerging class of enterprise mobility management (EMM) technology, says Eric Ahlm, a research director at Gartner. "When properly configured, EMM solutions create a corporate container that provides OS-level security and isolates apps and data in the container from what's outside," explains Ahlm. The corporate container can encompass email applications, Web browsers, customer mobile applications and off-the-shelf mobile applications. Within that container, IT can create isolated data-sharing and -protection policies, or easily deploy more mobile apps, or remove them -- all without touching the personal information outside of the container, he explains. "It makes all those issues go away."

On the personnel management side of the equation, companies should be sure to update their acceptable use policies to include BYOD. ENE's Thompson found that his company's acceptable use policy did not mention personally owned devices. So last year, says Thompson, ENE amended the policy to specify that "any use of corporate resources or systems, regardless of ownership of the devices, obligates the user to comply with the corporate acceptable use policy."